


Five Guys That Mike Webster Never Dated (An A Very Long Summer story)

by calathea



Series: A Very Long Summer [6]
Category: I Want To Go Home! - Korman
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-23
Updated: 2009-12-23
Packaged: 2017-10-05 01:45:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,409
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/36426
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/calathea/pseuds/calathea
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For the five things meme (post-Epilogue II)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Five Guys That Mike Webster Never Dated (An A Very Long Summer story)

**1\. Todd Philips**

Mike was digging in the depths of his locker for his Human Biology textbook when Todd, his lab partner in Chemistry class, came over to lean against wall near him.

"So, hey," said Todd, "You want to get together Saturday night?"

Mike pulled his head out of the locker. "Saturday? Do we have something due in Chem next week? I don't remember Mrs. Daniels assigning anything."

Todd blinked at him. "No," he said.

"Oh, thank god, I have this huge paper to write this weekend," said Mike, relieved, before reaching up to paw through the books on the top shelf of his locker. "Where the hell is my textbook?"

"I thought maybe we could get pizza, see a movie," Todd said, after a pause. His voice sounded a little strange.

Mike froze. Todd was a good guy: smart, willing to do his share of homework, funny, sometimes. If Vicky's little performances when Todd came over to study were anything to go by, he was good-looking, too. And he was gay, which was something Mike knew, in the way that you knew all kinds of stuff about people at school, but never really bothered to think about before now.

"I'm. That is," stuttered Mike. "I don't date."

Todd quirked an eyebrow at him. "Really?" He grinned. "Maybe I can change your mind about that."

"I don't date guys." Mike said, finally getting the words out.

Todd went red, suddenly, then white. "Oh. I thought..." he said, stammering a himself a little now.

"I'm sorry," said Mike, desperately, and Todd sort of shook his head.

It was a measure of how uncomfortable the moment was that when the pile of stuff on the top shelf of his locker that Mike had dislodged in his search for his biology textbook suddenly shifted and rained painfully down on his head, he was actually relieved. He crouched on the floor to collect his scattered belongings, and when he looked up, Todd was gone.

**2\. Jeffrey Miller**

Mike looked at the list of unread e-mail in his inbox in horror, and, shuddering, clicked on the first message in the series.

* * *

From: Liz.J.Miller@gmail.com  
To: jmiller78@utoronto.edu, rudy.miller@mcgill.edu, mwebster34@utoronto.edu  
Subject: HAHA TOO FUNNY

Hi boys!

Thought this was pretty funny!

Jeff, you had better call home this weekend, your dad wants to know what this charge is on his credit card. Don't forget.

I sent you another cake Mike, it should be with you in a couple of days.

Love, Mom (Liz)

Attachment: HAHA.jpg

* * *

Nervously, Mike opened the attachment. It was a scan of some kind of celebrity news report. In one corner of the page, Mrs. Miller had circled one photo in red. Mike squinted at the text below it.

> 'Also in town this week was Olympic champion Rudy Miller, who was competing in an athletic event at the University of Toronto. Miller is pictured here with his brother, Jeffrey, a freshman at the university, and his brother's partner Murray Webster, also a student.'

The photo showed the three of them leaving the Italian restaurant they had eaten at to celebrate Rudy's wins on the track. Mike groaned, and clicked on the next message.

* * *

From: jmiller78@utoronto.edu  
To: Liz.J.Miller@gmail.com  
CC: rudy.miller@mcgill.edu, mwebster34@utoronto.edu  
Subject: Re: HAHA TOO FUNNY  


Hahahaha! I told Rudy he should have run after that photographer.

That's a really horrible photo of me. I look like I have at least three chins.

I'll call home Saturday.

Jeff

PS. Why does Mike get cake and not me?

* * *

From: Liz.J.Miller@gmail.com  
To: jmiller78@utoronto.edu  
CC: rudy.miller@mcgill.edu, mwebster34@utoronto.edu  
Subject: Re: HAHA TOO FUNNY

&gt;&gt; That's a really horrible photo of me. I look like I have at least three chins.

&gt;&gt; PS. Why does Mike get cake and not me?

Maybe I was worried it wasn't just the photo giving you all those chins.

Love, Mom

* * *

From: rudy.miller@mcgill.edu  
To: Liz.J.Miller@gmail.com  
CC: mwebster34@utoronto.edu, jmiller78@utoronto.edu  
Subject: Re: HAHA TOO FUNNY

I think Mike should sue for defamation of character. He definitely has better taste than this article suggests.

R

* * *

From: jmiller78@utoronto.edu  
To: mwebster34@utoronto.edu  
Subject: Re: HAHA TOO FUNNY

Will you tell me when the cake arrives? I'll come over and help you eat it.

After all, I am your BOYFRIEND. Boyfriends share!

HAHA.

Jeff

* * *

From: Janet.Webster@hotmail.com  
To: mwebster34@utoronto.edu  
Subject: FWD: Funny!

Have you seen this? Liz Miller forwarded it to me. Thought it might make you laugh. :)

You look cold in the photo. I hope you wear a hat when you go out at night in the winter. You don't want your ears to get frostbite.

Mom :)

BEGIN FORWARDED MESSAGE:

&gt;&gt; From: Liz.J.Miller@gmail.com  
&gt;&gt; To: Janet.Webster@hotmail.com  
&gt;&gt; Subject: Funny!  


&gt;&gt; Thought you might like to see this! Mike looks cute in the photo.  
&gt;&gt;  
&gt;&gt; Don't think he'll be very pleased about them saying he's seeing Jeff though! (Who  
&gt;&gt; would be!)  
&gt;&gt;  
&gt;&gt; Talk to you soon! Liz.

Attachment: HAHA.jpg

END FORWARDED MESSAGE

* * *

From: rudy.miller@mcgill.edu  
To: mwebster34@utoronto.edu  
Subject: Re: HAHA TOO FUNNY

I'm leaving class at 12 on Friday and driving straight over to you. We can prepare your suit for defamation over dinner. You want me to make spaghetti again, or do you want to go out?

R

PS. If you ever change your name to Murray I'll have to dump you.  
PPS. Don't let Jeff eat all the cake.  
PPPS. You looked good in the photo.  


* * *

Mike groaned again, and let his forehead drop onto the desk.

**3\. Vlad the Weigh-Lifter**

Mike backed hastily away from the enormous, muscled man over whom he had just spilled half his drink.

"Yikes! Sorry!" he said.

The wall of muscle shifted, and Mike, panicking, wondered if he could make a run for it.

"Is no problem," said the man, "Here, have other drink."

He handed Mike the cup he was holding. By the slow care of his movements, Mike deduced that the man was drunk, and accepted the plastic cup nervously.

"I am Vlad. I win gold medal today," said Vlad, beaming at Mike. "I lift many weight."

"Uh," said Mike, "Congratulations?"

Vlad bared his teeth again. "You are athlete? You are enjoying Olympic Village?"

"Uh, no," said Mike, sidling away, "I'm here with a friend on the Canadian team."

"Ah! Canada!" said Vlad, grabbing another drink as a waiter passed by with a tray. "You are very pretty, Canadian boy. You wanna fuck?"

Mike, caught in the act of taking a gulp from the drink Vlad had handed him, sputtered at this. "Oh, I, uh," he said, desperately, and made a spirited attempt to dodge the ham-like hand that descended upon his shoulder. Vlad frowned as his hand missed Mike by inches, and, apparently assuming he had simply misjudged Mike's location, tried again. Mike dodged again, and headed for a gap in the crowded room.

Rudy's hand on his arm stopped him. "He's with me," said Rudy, calmly.

"He too pretty to be with you," slurred the giant, looming over Rudy dramatically. He suddenly swayed on his feet. "He. He…"

Rudy raised an eyebrow, then reached out and tapped his finger against Vlad's right shoulder. Vlad's eyes rolled up and he keeled over, his gargantuan muscles slapping the floor loudly as he fell.

"Really, Mike," Rudy sighed, stepping delicately over the fallen weight lifter's legs. "I don't know why you insist on befriending the local wildlife."

**4\. Nick Crown**

Mike replaced the receiver of the phone with extraordinary care, drawing in one shuddering breath after another, as near to tears as he could ever remember being in his adult life. He dropped his head into his hands.

He was just so tired. His clinics had been full to overflowing with flu cases for weeks, and half the staff had succumbed as well, leaving him and a few others to soldier on, carrying the bulk of the paediatrics practice between them. In between the puking, miserable children today had been a case he suspected would turn out to be childhood leukaemia, and the return of little Stephen Adams, who flinched away from every touch, and whose injuries looked terrifying like sexual abuse.

Even going home didn't help. The boys were still recovering from flu, and were exhausted, pale and whiny. Their housekeeper had unexpectedly vanished one night last week, apparently to meet and subsequently marry a man she met over the Internet who lived in the wilds of Alaska. Rudy was somewhere in Asia, doing something related to one of his business interests, and wouldn't be home for a week. And now, this call, from David's teacher, asking for yet another parent-teacher conference, the fifth this semester, and Mike knew he still had no answers for her.

There was a soft knock on his door, and it swung open a little. Nick Crown, one of the more junior doctors in the practice, put his head around the door. "Mike?" he began.

Seeing Mike, unmoving and miserable, he slipped into the room, closing the door behind him. "Mike? Are you all right? Is it the flu?"

"I'm fine," said Mike, looking up, but hearing the hoarse strain in his own voice, knew he wasn't convincing.

Nick came to sit on the corner of the desk, and laid a hand gently on Mike's shoulder. "Mike, do you need to go home? You look terrible."

"No, I…" Mike started, then looked down at the note he'd made on his deskpad about meeting David's teacher. "Maybe. Can you cover my patients? There aren't many left, three, all routine."

Nick agreed straight away, "Of course, whatever you need."

"I need to. I need to get some things sorted out at home," said Mike, and stood up. Too hastily, it turned out, as he swayed, suddenly nauseated, in place.

Nick reached out to steady him. "Mike, seriously, you look awful." His hand dropped to Mike's waist.

Just for a moment, a long, terrible moment, Mike was tempted to lean, to take the comfort he knew Nick would offer, if he asked. It was something Mike had known about Nick from the start – the little spark between them that they both recognised and ignored – something he had been certain he would never take advantage of, until that moment.

Then he shook off Nick's hand, and said, "No. Yes, I'll be fine. I just have to go home." His stomach rolled and dropped as he saw the hurt and shame on Nick's face, quickly masked though it was.

He felt old, old and grey and numb when Nick helped him into his coat, handed him his bag. He drove home in a fog. The boys were already home when he got there, and he watched them, sprawled half-asleep in front of the TV watching cartoons, while he talked to their after-school sitter. Xav looked back at him, wide-eyed and silent, from one corner of the sofa.

He tried to smile, went through to the study to put his bags down, and then picked up the phone to start making some calls.

His mother arrived 12 hours later and took over the household while he collapsed in bed, flu-ridden and defeated. Rudy flew home four days early, and bullied and lied his way through school board bureaucracy until somehow a solution was arrived at for David.

Nick only stayed at the clinic another month, before accepting a position in another practice across town.

**5\. ~~Rudy Miller~~**

Twenty-five years later, at his High School reunion, he and Rudy (who had insisted on coming no matter what Mike said) came face to face with Todd Philips at the bar. They were part of the way through the usual exclamations and introductions, when Rudy reached out to tug Mike out of the way of some people edging through the crowd. Todd looked at Rudy's hand, lingering still on the crook of Mike's elbow, and laughed.

"He told me once, you know," Todd said, grinning at Rudy, "That he didn't date guys."

Rudy raised an eyebrow. "The trick is," Rudy said, urbanely, sipping at his glass of wine, "Not to tell him that you're dating him."

Todd blinked. "Yeah?"

Rudy just raised his eyebrow again, this time at Mike.

"What?" said Mike, looking at Rudy in surprise. "We never dated, exactly. I'm sure I would remember that."

"I was very stealthy about it," Rudy explained, patiently.

"What?" said Mike, confused. "When? Where? Huh?"

Rudy nodded. "Precisely."

Mike frowned. Rudy stared back at him, bland as ever. Todd started to laugh.

Another man came over to join them, and as Todd introduced his partner, they moved away from the topic of dating. Later that evening, as Rudy drove them back to their hotel, Mike watched his hands on the steering wheel of the car, Rudy's wedding band a paler gold circle against his tanned skin.

"Did you have a good time?" Mike asked, sleepy and more drunk than he expected.

Rudy shifted, the stiff fabric of his suit rustling in the darkness. "I developed an abiding gratitude for your family's hair genes," he said, "I've never seen so much male pattern baldness in one place before now."

Mike laughed. "It could happen to me, yet. My dad doesn't have much in the way of hair."

Rudy looked over at him. "Well, that might be a deal-breaker for me," he said, seriously, and pulled in to the hotel car park.

Mike flailed at the door handle, and then graciously allowed Rudy to assist him out of the car when he appeared at the passenger side door. "I'd just have to stealth date you back," he said, leaning heavily on Rudy as they walked through the lobby of the hotel. "You'll have to give me tips."

Rudy propped him in the corner of the elevator. "It's not very stealthy if I'm helping," he pointed out, slipping an arm around Mike's waist to prevent him from sliding along the wall.

"Oh," Mike pondered this for a moment as he ambled unsteadily towards their door. "Will you date me not-stealthily, then?"

Rudy pushed him through the door into their room. "For as long as you like," he said, and made himself useful undoing Mike's tie. The bedroom door swung closed behind them.


End file.
